Web of Memories
by ShockAndAwe
Summary: Random parts of Neyla's untold story; how she came to be who she was, and how she was truly innocent through it all. Will be rated M along the road for events later on in the story, but only T for now.
1. Artha, or The Orphan

Disclaimer: Sucker Punch owns Sly Cooper and his wonderful video game franchise; everything here is pretty much not mine.

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><p><span>Artha; The Orphan<span>

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><p>"<em>But I, being poor, have only my dreams. I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly, because you tread on my dreams." –William Butler Yeats<em>

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><p>Neyla hid in the shadows, blending into the walls as well as any chameleon could. The gloomy castle was (thankfully) mostly lit by candles and torches; only the pesky Shadow Guard possessed any strong lights, and it was easy enough to see where and how one could remain undetected from their poor eyesight. Besides, the ones she had the pleasure of sharing a room with presently were dashing down the corridors to the ground level, squawking nervously and clutching their crossbows. What was the excitement for? Neyla didn't give much of a damn, honestly. She could hear the mortar of some of her biplanes zooming by outside; perhaps the cheeky bastards had blown up something important. Oh well. She could deal with that later. Interpol practically licked her toes with admiration and trust on these matters; they wouldn't mind if she was a bit lazy working around to it.<p>

Besides. She had more important things to attend to. More so as in how in the world she was to lure the Contessa away from her glued position in the room with Old Ironsides. The eight-legged bitch never seem fazed enough by anything occurring outside to dare to even move an inch away from her post, constantly tearing away at Inspector Fox's psyche. Maybe in the past Neyla would've felt a bit of pity for the vixen. The Contessa was frighteningly exemplary at her hypnosis work. But Carmelita had seemed intent on being a cunt even when they worked together, and it was interesting to see if she would indeed crack under the pressure.

Inching every so closely, Neyla flattened herself against the wall. The door frame barely gave any cover, but she was rather adept at finding ways to obscure herself from view. It was a blessing in itself that Neyla wasn't cursed with a stocky frame, or had a protruding belly to unceremoniously reveal her to wanton eyes; no, she was sleek and trim… invisible to anyone and everyone she wished to avoid.

She had crept in the middle of some banter, it seemed. "…readjust your face!" Carmelita spat, trying furiously to push against the iron shackles that held her to the elevated table. Her eyes were an eerie white, glowing under the rays of power emanating from the Clockwerk eyes.

The eyes. There they were. Strapped onto some mad scientist's wet dream of a hypnosis machine. Cold yellow orbs that had once provided sight for the metallic bird of lore, one of the most evil villains ever to walk the earth, stared down both Inspector Fox and Neyla herself; she felt as if they were inspecting her, evaluating her, probing her.

But they had also belonged to one of the most powerful villains ever to walk the earth, and it was for this reason that she needed them. Or rather, her aerodynamically-challenged mentor did. Either way, she was the one who had to steal them from the enormous spider. It was going to be a hard job, and likely painful as a result, but she'd nursed cracked ribs before, and really, it would all be worth it in the end.

It was all supposed to be worth it in the end.

But apparently, it wouldn't have to be a hard job for her after all; lost in her thoughts, Neyla suddenly realized that somehow Old Ironsides had broken free from her restraints, and had carefully collected her trusty shock pistol whilst the Contessa typed away at a console, oblivious to the liberation. Neyla sunk back even further in the shadows. Would they do all the hard work for her? It seemed a very likely possibility.

"A-ha! I've isolated the brain pattern… you and I are about to become the best of friends," the widow sneered, never turning around to look at her captive audience.

"Okay, new best friend," the vixen grinned. "Hands up, and I mean all of 'em."

The Contessa spoke, but all Neyla heard was the beating of her heart echoing in her ears, and then all she felt was the whoosh of wind sifting through the fur on her face as the spider came running by, yelling like a scared child. Running away to her guards? More than likely. The Contessa was not one for physical combat. Inspector Fox came trailing in hot pursuit, wielding her pistol dangerously and yelling what either could have been "witch" or "bitch". Either way, Neyla smiled wide in her hiding place. Both threats had taken care of themselves; this would be too easy.

Except an iron gate that she had failed to notice before suddenly crashed down, slamming against the stone wall, and she retreated further back into the dark. Out of this new entrance came someone she'd been afraid to see for some time. The turtle, she could care less about; as she thought about it, Neyla realized she'd never even known they'd been carrying a reptile in the Cooper Gang operation. But he floated down into sight, clad in his usual blue, and her heart froze.

It was Sly. That goddamn raccoon was back in the picture again. The knife she thought she'd tossed away back in India at the tiger's jungle refuge stabbed into her chest once more, letting the pain seep out like blood from a wound. She was tempted to punch herself in the torso, or maybe smack her own face. She couldn't break down like this, not when the mission depended on it. But even so, she had already seen his smiling face, joking with the turtle (while it placed some sort of circular vacuum onto a device she'd heard the Contessa call "Mind-shuffler"), and the sound of his voice made it even worse.

Words crept across her mind, flashing in front of her eyes. _Betrayal. Money. Evil. Fortune. Sunesh. Thief. Backstabber. India. Date._ There were plenty of others as well, plaguing her conscience as a heated rash covers one's skin. To an observant bystander, Neyla seemed composed and strikingly alert; on the inside, her thoughts were whirling out of control in her head.

The only thing that knocked her out of it was the explosion.

Suddenly, the room filled with red gas, noxious and thick in her lungs as she breathed it in. The haze made a perfect cover, hiding her from being detected, and she ran in, having located what was surely a Clockwerk eye lying on the ground. The orb was staring into her once more, and although she shuddered, Neyla dared to pick it up anyway.

The minute she touched it, she felt as if she was falling down a bottomless well, the light of the room above her growing smaller and smaller as she catapulted down further. Eventually, all was dark.

But she had ended up somewhere else, actually. Somewhere very strange.

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><p>This was long ago. Long, long, long ago. The streets of New Delhi there were dust and dirt, not paved road. The houses were made of tin, wood, scrap metal; mere shacks, only viable for the most basic of household needs, and even then not that useful. The citizens were all of varying ages and in various stages of loitering, ranging from the hyper children running about to the stationary senior citizens who rested for their awaited deaths (and presumable reincarnation). Neyla knew this place all too well. These were her neighborhoods, those alleys and dirt fields were her lawns, those poverty-stricken people were her neighbors. That shanty, small and filthy and depressing, was her home.<p>

These were the slums of New Delhi, and this was a Neyla who knew nothing other than being poor and others who were poor.

She was a passenger in her own young body, an observer of her own memory. How old was she currently? Neyla could feel her long dark hair bouncing behind her as she ran with some other slum children, anonymous faces in her past that she had once held bonds with; if she hadn't been wearing the headdress yet, then this predated her preteen years. She felt disproportionately short, as the adults near her seemed to be looming like ominous giants and the roofs of the shacks looked as if they were towering up near the sky like skyscrapers. Neyla figured that she was somewhere in the single digit age, as in seven or six years old.

It didn't matter much to her; the important part was that she was rather young, and she was running happily with the other children through the legs of indifferent grown-ups. Grown-ups. This was an age where she would call them grown-ups, and with the slight edge of distaste in her voice. They were taller and older and wiser, but the contempt for them being over twelve years of age was inherent in Neyla for as long as she could remember.

Grown-ups.

The memory remained more of the same, mindless sprinting and giggling whilst a slower child brought up in the rear. Neyla supposed they were playing tag. Or maybe cops and robbers. Either way, she ended up playing cops and robbers in real life in her adult years. Sometimes even on both sides at once. It got very, very tricky. But she managed it. She always managed it.

So far, the memory had been pointless, and Neyla was wondering angrily why she'd been brought back to this particular moment for no good reason when suddenly her younger self decided to cheat a little and run back home. Neyla knew this not because she could read her own mind, but because she had taken this same route for years to go back to the house; past Mahadik's butcher shop, through the alley with the dumpster and the stain that looked remarkably like Africa, under the rose garden Lakia Dubey kept, and straight ahead through the crowds of people to her own shack, where her mother would be found doing laundry and her father would be found sitting around, smoking and talking to his close friends.

It was all in the routine.

The younger Neyla performed it flawlessly, never missing a beat, and Neyla realized that even in childhood, she'd shown the proficiency at acrobatics that would make her such an athletic goddess in adulthood. The crawl under the rose garden almost always left some dirt in her hair, but it seemed that day that she gotten through as clean as humanly possible. All that was left was the large road and crowds of people to duck through. Young Neyla did that as well, gracefully to boot. But when she arrived at the shack, Neyla realized what memory this was.

The spot her father usually sat in was empty, not just of her father but of his favorite chair as well. She'd attributed that, although puzzled, to him deciding to sit elsewhere with his group of friends that day. It seemed logical enough, although she could barely remember a time when he hadn't been parked in front of the house during the day. The line that usually held drying laundry was mostly empty, save for some of her clothing, but she didn't notice that until later. Or rather, until it was too late.

What truly raised the alarm in her innocent mind was the fact that her mother was not home. True, her father almost constantly lazed about in that chair, but now and then he left for one reason or another; it was most shocking to see that her mother, the homebody of the family, had left the shack alone. Neyla dared a search around the small room that they had, and although she saw her own blankets for sleeping, at the time the absence of her parents' evaded Neyla's attention completely. She'd been so stupid, so oblivious back then. A foolish child, a stupid, stupid baby that couldn't think for itself even if it tried.

When she stepped back out of the shack to look about and hope perhaps that maybe she could spot one of her parents, a pudgy piece of shit called Gopi Kadam came thumping along. He was an adult, perhaps in his forties or fifties; greasy, missing some teeth, unnaturally obese for being so poor, Gopi possessed a cold heart (or perhaps not even a heart at all). Neyla had heard in her youth that he liked to beat children whenever there was no one else around to see. He never came near her as such, but she'd seen the bruises on other children, and the gap-toothed smile of his whenever such a child crossed his path. In addition to all that, however, Gopi also enjoyed inserting himself into gossip and rumors. The man left a path of social destruction behind him, causing fights and spilling dirty secrets for all to hear.

He approached her, grinning cheekily, and leaned against a nearby barrel. They stared at each other for a few moments, neither one breaking eye contact or even blinking.

"Looking for your mama, eh? Your papa, eh?" he said, grinning widely. Slowly, she nodded her head. "Ah, I see, I see. Well, good luck with that, little girl. You see me? And my friends over there, you see them too? We watched your parents. They waited until you were gone, off running with your little shit-covered friends. They packed up their things, their clothes, even that nice chair. They ran away from this place. Guess they didn't like the New Delhi slums too much, eh? But you… you're thinking, 'This man is a liar. My parents would _never_ leave me.' I get that, I get that. But they did, little girl. They flew out of that nest and left behind the baby bird to die. I guess they never really loved you, yeah? Or why else would they leave behind their only daughter?"

Neyla remained composed and spoke not a word throughout the bastard's diatribe. She was proud of herself, both then and now, for it. Gopi grinned some more, but when he got no response, he merely scowled and waddled off, presumably to bother someone else or beat a child. Whatever he did, Neyla didn't care. She was most preoccupied with trying to fight off the creeping suspicions that Gopi's words had created in the back of her mind. Try as she might, her excuses seemed powerless against the uncertainties bouncing through her thoughts.

The older Neyla, looking back through Time's memory lens, needed to go no further in the memory. She knew what came next well enough. She waited the rest of the day and the night for her parents to return. She kept vigil by the open door, anxious to see her purple-furred mother striding up the road with groceries or flowers or whatever had presumably kept her pre-occupied in hand. She had wanted to see her mother the most. But as the next day's sun rose on the horizon, young Neyla began to cry. Because the rest of that day, they didn't come back. And they never would. Even at such a young age, she realized that she had been abandoned.

She guessed they never really loved her. Or why else would they leave behind their only daughter? Purposely taken their possessions from the house? Left when she would not be around to see them leaving? There was no way she could protect her family from the truth of the act they had committed.

They'd left her behind.

On the third day, she rose from her shack, and found the usual gang of neighborhood children she played with.

She found the peacock boy, the biggest and toughest one of them, and beat him to a bloody pulp, the stains of tears still fresh on her cheeks.

It was from there that she formed her first posse.

It was from there that she stopped being a child.

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><p>During this flashback, adult Neyla had been running on auto-pilot. Bantered with Cooper, ordered an airstrike, ran with her eye, and eventually been caught on a spider web. It had been her, yes… but it had not been her, too. Someone, or rather something, had been using her in the meantime. When she woke up and tore the cobweb away, it appeared everything had happened too late, although she was able to machinate a lock-up of the Contessa to give her reputation a further burst within the police force.<p>

But whatever had taken over when she was gone had not disappeared.

Not yet.

And she swore in her dreams that night (or rather, her nightmares) that those yellow eyes of hate were tearing through her soul.


	2. Artha, or The Student

Disclaimer: Sly Cooper? Not mine. At all.

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><p><span>Artha; The Student<span>

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><p>"<em>Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending." –Maria Robinson<em>

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><p>She woke up with something akin to a hangover the morning after her encounter with the Cooper Gang in Prague. Her head hurt awfully bad; it seemed as if her brain was pressing violently against the back of her eyes, and the room was spinning a bit. With a pained groan, she rubbed her temples and tore the blankets from her body. She couldn't that morning, but Neyla knew the sight well enough to imagine the view from her bedroom. Gray, dull Prague. At least before there had been the buzz of conflict to liven things up before, but now with that gone, all that was left was the gloomy, uninspired Czech Republic city.<p>

And all that was left was her killer headache. The throbbing echoed through her skull, ricocheting pain in every spot imaginable. She was practically stumbling over to the medicine cabinet, clutching her head and biting her lip to hold back a cry of agony. Blindly, Neyla knocked into both the doorframe and the sink before she was able to find the cabinet's handle and swing it open so forcefully that the little door fell off its hinges. It smacked against the floor, echoing in her eardrums. She'd worry about it later, when she had something to tide over the anguish.

Daring to open one eye, Neyla found that her vision was doubled, and tinged red

(_like the gas it was like the gas in that room what the fuck had she inhaled what was it)_

ever so slightly. Still, even in the blinding haze of her suffering, she was able to locate the ibuprofen, and taking what could be a dangerous gamble stuffed four or five tablets into her mouth. She didn't take time to down it with water, swallowing it hurriedly in an attempt to alleviate the pain as soon as humanly possible. Standing there waiting for it to subside, Neyla realized in fact that she wasn't standing, but that she'd been reduced to kneeling on the linoleum floor, cringing against the wall and gripping the porcelain sink above her tightly.

Neyla remained this way for a few minutes. The only sound in the room was her ragged breathing, decreasing in volume as time slipped by and the painkillers began to take effect; it had seemed like hours of waiting, but eventually she was able to hoist herself back up to a standing position, albeit supported the sink. She dared to open her eyes once more. No longer were they doubled or clouded with red, although the ceiling light in the bathroom seared into her sight like the sun itself. With a grimace, she swatted the light switch down, expelling all light from the room almost immediately. There were no windows, and even if there had been, Neyla suspected it would have been much the same. It seemed in Prague that the constant climate was dark, grey, rainy, and humid.

Once more Neyla slowly rubbed her temples, although this attempt resulted successfully in working away the stubborn remains of the migraine she'd experienced. Breathing heavily, she gazed upward into the open medicine cabinet. Various bottles and boxes lay askew within and outside the cabinet, strew onto the sink and the floor. Indeed, the spot on the sink where she had grasped onto now sported deep gashes in the exact array of her claws. It was a shock to Neyla that the sink hadn't simply cracked apart. Perhaps she had exercised some restraint somehow in the throes of distress.

Someone else could clean up the mess. Maybe even she would, later on. She wasn't much in the mood for it at present. There were other things on her mind.

Closing the cabinet door, she carefully climbed into the shower, stripping her nightgown and dropping it behind her nonchalantly. Neyla lived alone anyway; what did anyone care if she went to sleep stark naked except for a flimsy gown? Exactly. Not at all. In any case, it had been an unexpected blessing to be able to jump into the shower so quickly. The only way she could truly exorcise a migraine from her head was to take a long, hot shower. It helped take away the other aches she hadn't noticed due to the crippling headache as well; sore hips, sore knees, sore feet… running so much in a night could take its toll.

**Better to fly.**

Neyla, having been covering her hair softly with shampoo, froze immediately. She could feel her tail rise up, almost as an antenna searching for a signal. Had she really heard that? Had that been in her head? A couple of nights ago the eight-legged whore had sent some poltergeists over to headquarters, and one or two had been of the talking variety, but the priests and the Interpol Paranormal Division had taken care of them already. Neyla always had "voices" in her head, but these were of the normal type, exemplifying different parts of her psyche or personality or conscience or whatever you preferred to call it. But this voice? It was cold; cold like a robot, a piece of machinery void of any feeling or human emotion.

She was slightly frightened to find that she was literally shaking as well, feeling a cold breeze even though she was surrounded by the heated air and warm water of the small shower. Her fur, although wet, stood on end, and Neyla could feel the wormy chill of goosebumps slithering down her neck and into her back. She exhaled heavily, annoyed that she was spooked out over what could easily have been nothing, and found (to her extreme fright) that she could see her own breath. Neyla glanced nervously back at the temperature dial. It was still dialed to red. Eager to dispel her fear, she turned it to its hottest possible setting, and in the process scalded a good portion of her left arm. With a yelp, she jumped back into the opposite wall, slipping on the puddle beneath her and crashing through the curtains.

"FUCK!" she exclaimed, grabbing the curtain rod a last-minute attempt to stop the fall. Neyla's momentum carried her too quickly, and the rod tore out of the wall with her. Her back collided with the ground, providing a sickening thump, and the curtain rod bounced out of her hands. She skidded along for a moment or two before the leg still hooked inside of the shower caught her, jerking her back painfully and causing her to moan slightly. In the darkness, the rod appeared out of nowhere, smacking down squarely upon Neyla's forehead. With an infuriated roar, she smacked the rod away, jerking about spastically as she attempted to regain her footing. She accomplished this, although it took much too long than it should have and Neyla felt embarrassingly sure that her fall would have looked enormously comical to any observer.

"Fuck," she said once more, biting her lip and caressing her forehead. She could feel a bruise forming. What a great way to start the morning. Angrily, she tore a towel off its rack and dried herself, wrapping it around her body once she was done. Her hair? Likely a mess. She would tend to it later, though. There was plenty of time left in her morning routine.

What preoccupied her still was that chilling voice, the one that Neyla was adamantly sure had not been her imagination, and the unusual occurrence she'd gone through in the shower. The Czech Republic was proving to be too supernatural for her tastes. Indeed, this was what she attributed it to at first, explaining it away as yet another consequence of being in a part of the city too near to the Contessa's mystical castle. But in the back of her head, the part that always seemed to know the absolute truth, this did not ring quite right.

Not right at all.

So lost in her thoughts, Neyla was, that she didn't see the yellow eyes staring intently at her from the mirror's reflection. If she'd turned around, she would not have seen them there physically; but within that mirror, they resided, and at that moment, they were nakedly calculating the tigress, absorbing her into their vision. It was not of a sexual connotation. Whether she was nude or clothed meant nothing to them. It was only she, Captain Neyla, who they desired to study.

A mere moment later, Neyla looked upward into the mirror's reflection. The eyes had disappeared discretely, leaving behind no trace of their appearance in the small bathroom. Still, though, they had even more to do with the woman.

It was with this that Neyla stared into her own reflection and found it distorted grossly: her eyes large and incandescent yellow; her fur turned a metallic grey, splattered with bloody rust; her face contorted into an expression of complete rage; and her body shriveling into nothing more than bones.

In reality, she threw up and fell headfirst into the sink.

In her mind, once more she found herself falling down a bottomless well of darkness. Where was the light? Going, going, gone.

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><p>There were three rapt knocks at the door, echoing through the room. Hurriedly, she shoved the notebooks under her bed and dusted off her shit, tidying up for whatever company she could be receiving.<p>

"Ms. Kahn? Ms. Matilda Kahn?" the voice quavered through the door. Neyla opened up the door and put on her widest ditz smile.

"Yes?" she said. She'd been in Britain too long; even without thought she resorted to the Cockney accent as a basic dialect. It seemed she'd been rid of her bothersome Indian accent.

Good riddance, she felt.

A bloodhound, brown and wrinkled, stood at the door, shuffling slightly. He spoke in a deep drawl, and seemed very out of place for a British university, even more so than Neyla (or at least, when she had first snuck in).

"A 'Lord Wadsworth' at the front desk seeks to acquire an audience with you."

Neyla did not respond. In her mind, she cursed vehemently. Whoever Matilda Khan truly was, she apparently had a guest. The bloodhound opened up one wrinkled eye and peered out into Neyla's face.

"He says he knows you from a trip to Bosnia…?"

Neyla considered the bloodhound's message. Could she escape from the room in time to dupe the two of them? There would be some pipe climbing and roof-hopping, but she felt she could accomplish a temporary getaway. Or maybe a permanent kind of running away, if the school officials caught on. Either way, she would end up going back for her more important possessions; this Wadsworth fellow, the inconvenient fool, would not interrupt her from that at the very least.

"Ah, yes, Bosnia. I remember now. It's been so long!" she exclaimed, feigning with ease the authentic emotions of someone fondly remembering forgotten pleasures. "Send 'im right up. Ah… actually, scratch that thought, gimme a moment or two to prepare myself for company in me quarters." Still, the fake smile tore across her face, and eventually the bloodhound responded with a small smile of his own. That was good. A response with a smile of any sort meant her charm had worked its magic yet again.

"Ayuh. I'll give you a few moments to tidy up in there."

Neyla almost had the door closed and was planning extensively to collect her notebooks as she flew out the window when abruptly a dignified voice floated out of the hallway and into her ears. Irritated, she poked her head through the door's crack once more. Standing before her was a distinguished-looking parrot, dressed in a style reminiscent of the Italian Renaissance and encased in a steam-powered wooden cage. He seemed like a da Vinci of sorts. Fortunately, he was small. She could just push him down and send him reeling into oblivion while she escaped from the possible exposure.

The bloodhound had disappeared. Even better.

The two of them stood on opposite sides of the door, staring intently at one another. He was the first to break, smiling mischievously.

"My dear, attempting to run away from the situation would merely be counter-productive. You and I both know you're not Matilda Kahn and never will be. I'm not even Lord Wadsworth, if we're to be honest with each other."

A moment of silence.

"Who are you?" Neyla ventured, raising a puzzled eyebrow. It seemed this specimen was of more interest than she'd originally estimated.

"I believe I have more of a right to ask you of your identity, my sweet. You're the unlawful impersonator at this fine institution," the parrot smirked. Amused, Neyla allowed a chuckle.

"Indeed, you've caught me… 'Lord Wadsworth'. The name's Neyla."

"Also known as Venus Verma in certain parts of the Indian Black Market, correct? Dear, don't let your mouth hang open like so, bugs could fly right in you know."

Neyla was tempted to crack the cage open and strangle the monocle weakling then and there, but as someone with so much information about her, she could not allow him to leave her in any shape or form without some answers of her own.

"Yes, actually."

"Good. Dear, you must have a true title with more than one name; I have no doubt you would find it shocking, the sheer amount of women going by Neyla in the criminal underground, particularly in India… no matter. I seem to have found you, in any case. Go on. You may ask of me a question. I can see it burning in your eyes."

He thought he could read her? The only emotions others saw were the ones she wanted them to see; otherwise, she was in control at all times. No, this measly parrot did not hold a skill everyone else in the world seemingly could not even dream to attempt around her. It was rubbish.

"Your name? _Dear_?"

He grinned. "I go by Arpeggio around these parts. You may not have heard of me—"

"No, I 'aven't, please enlighten me." She disliked how frivolous his voice sounded.

"—but I'm more than likely than one of the most brilliant minds in the criminal world we are forced to abide with in this day and age. As are you, from what I have heard."

"So that's 'ow you've 'eard of me?" Neyla said, perking up slightly. The bird nodded. "Who's been talking?"

"It is the good type of talking, I can assure you, Ms. Neyla. You see, dear, your scope of talent and deviousness matches mine quite well. I imagine that your imagination and your pursuits are quite grand and intelligent, yes?"

Slowly, she nodded her affirmation.

"Excellent."

"Sorry, but could you maybe cut the bullshit and tell me why the fuck you've decided to come barging into my dorm-room—"

"Ms. Kahn's actually, I believe."

"…who gives a shit. Listen, tell me why you're 'ere or that pretty little machine of yours is likely to become a pile of garbage within the next few minutes." She'd been feisty back then. In control, most certainly, but sometimes the anger had expressed itself too easily as compared to the others. The parrot had seemed unfazed.

"How does immortality sound, Ms. Neyla? And not the kind that relies on folklore or legends to be achieved. This is immortality that has real, concrete evidence, and a procedure to follow."

A pause of consideration.

"I'm listening."

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><p>She awoke once more, focusing upon her rippled reflection. Everything seemed to drowned dark brown water; ashamedly, she recognized the shimmering instead as that of coffee in a mug. Namely her mug, which sat on the table in front of her, accompanied by a toasted bagel, a newspaper, and a creeping sense of dread filling her heart ever so quickly.<p>

She'd blacked out again. And yet again, she'd woken up in a strange place.

Hurriedly, she tried to retrieve the memories of what she done during her reminiscing. She'd been able to do it before after her run-in with Cooper.

(_oh God I'm so sorry I never meant I never meant not like this no not like this not_)

It took some doing, but Neyla accomplished it once more. Some of the smaller details were fuzzier, though. And why was red seeping into the image like spilt blood? So many things were on her mind, in her brain, harassing her thoughts unrepentantly.

**Give in, then.**

She was close to crying on the inside. What the fuck was wrong with her? What in God's name was wrong with her mind? Neyla distrusted doctors of both the medical and psychological practice, but she could feel a reluctant visit coming in the near future. That red dust… it must have been a hallucinogenic of some sort, or else she was just allergic to it in a very peculiar way.

Very peculiar indeed.

Quietly, she sipped her coffee. Her hand trembled. It was almost imperceptible, really, but she was all too aware of its nervous twitching.

The monster inside watched intently throughout, a hungry lion peering out from behind the iron bars of a cage.


	3. Artha, or The Constable

Disclaimer: I love Sly Cooper, but no way in hell do I own it.

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><p><span>Artha; The Constable<span>

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><p>"<em>Society prepares the crime, the criminal commits it." –Henry Thomas Buckle<em>

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><p>"Lay down on the table, Ms. Neyla."<p>

The nurse pointed, looking slightly bored, and Neyla obliged, lowering herself onto the cold steel. The MRI machine loomed above her, a metal monster anxious to swallow her like a snack. She disliked hospitals, doctors, any type of medical practice, but this was necessary. She needed to see if some screws were loose upstairs. Or at least if a physical affliction was driving her to the fuzzy edges of sanity.

Still, all this goddamn white was unsettling. She hated brightly-lit places; it seemed destiny that she should despise hospitals, as useful as they seemed in premise. Nightclubs, alleys, nighttime… they were her allies. Not this blinding light. The light had never done her any good, not in her life.

"All right, all right, let's get movin' now deary, shall we? Jesus Christ, you're goin' so fucking slow," Neyla snapped. Her discomfort had pushed her stress levels even higher; the bored nurse immediately perked up and embarrassedly clicked the button, shuffling Neyla's body into the confined space of the MRI machine. Neyla sighed deeply. Now they would expect her to stay still for a long time. Well, she could achieve that quite easily, but she was bothered already, and the necessity of remaining completely still only added even more to her annoyance. Ever since that fucking Cooper had shown up again, she'd been experiencing odd moments and random pains. It must have almost a week later and she was still constantly uneasy, a ship churning about dangerously in the storm at the port. She didn't want to capsize. She didn't want to sink. Not when everything was getting so close to working. Not when immortality was coming even closer to within her grasp.

Lights surrounded her, studying her in a circular motion. She sighed once more. It'd been a coincidence, more than likely. She couldn't blame the raccoon for her ailments, as much as she would have liked to. As much as she would've liked to have been able to blame him for anything. But yet again, he remained comparatively innocent. It seemed whatever dealing she had with him, she was the villain. No doubt she was a shifty person, on the gray scale of morality… but she wasn't a villain… was she? She didn't deserve the infamy of someone of such scale as, say, Clockwerk.

One of the lights burst within the MRI machine, and Neyla jumped. She could hear the nurse muttering, furious button clicking. It seemed the platform she was resting upon was attempting to exit out of the hole, but was stuck. Stuck on what? It certainly wasn't her. More than likely a malfunction.

She fucking hated hospitals.

"Uh, ma'am? We seem to—" the nurse squeaked.

"I'm trapped in this piece of shit, aren't I?" Neyla said softly.

"…Yes."

"Fucking fabulous. Go. Run off and get your superiors. See if you can't get me out of this 'ell'ole." She could hear the nurse's shoes pattering against the floor quickly and the slam of the door as it closed behind her. Goddamn shoddy hospital had her trapped inside a malfunctioning MRI machine. The space was too small to maneuver, the opening too confined to allow her to shuffle out. She was caught, all right. There was no escaping from this.

**Perfect.**

She smacked her head sitting up so quickly, but Neyla ignored the ache rushing into her head.

"WHO THE FUCK SAID THAT?" she screamed. No answer, as she'd predicted. "GET. THE FUCK. OUT OF _MY_ 'EAD. YOU 'EAR ME?" Still no response, but she felt as if something was listening to her yells… even enjoying them, in some sick, twisted way. Or was that her imagination? It was getting hard to tell the difference between instincts and insanity.

She collapsed back onto the platform in exasperation, punching the inside of the machine half-heartedly. This was her luck. This was just her luck. She tried to trick herself a lot by saying that her complete control over other people put her two steps ahead of the entire world, but Neyla knew there was too much bullshit in her life to make up for the karmic slag.

**Sleep.**

Neyla could feel the yell starting to rise out from her chest and burst through her mouth, a mixture of fear and anger, but the bubbling scream slid back halfway through its ascent; she found her eyelids drooping heavily, and suddenly Neyla was falling yet again down the deep, black hole she seemed to return to every few days or so.

For once, Neyla found herself yearning for the light.

* * *

><p>The handcuffs chaffed against her wrists, clinking as Neyla was escorted roughly by a pig on one arm and a German shepherd on the other. Her shoes scraped along the floor, squeaking noisily through the empty halls, and she could see the shepherd's ears twitch in pain at each high-pitched squeal. She grinned sneakily. At least she wasn't the only one suffering through all of this shit.<p>

In the planning stage, only words floating around an open room, it sounded painless enough. Especially for the bird, the idea was flawless; she'd get caught by the fuzz on purpose, jimmy off her handcuffs, sneak around like the acrobat she was, and relieve the local police station of its most confidential files. Apparently Arpeggio, the intelligent bastard, had been able to track down some of the most important files regarding the Fiendish Five gang; they'd been cleverly hidden in a lower-ranking station, what would've seemed like mere fodder for any criminals such as themselves seeking to acquire high-class information on law-breaking legends. It was quite clever of the police, actually. But they didn't quite know the references her avian friend had.

Still, when put in practice, it'd been a pain in the ass allowing those fat, sweaty cops to grab her and restrain her. She knew she'd been felt up at least twice by the phantom hands of an officer working under the cover of physical restraint, and pig breath smelt even worse when confronted up close; the only relatively nice part had been the fact that they'd come bursting through her door of her own accord instead of the purposely-shoddy robbery Neyla'd been planning to pull off to alert the police of her presence. Apparently, there'd been a rat in her homework ring operation, and sooner then she'd thought they had chained her up and read her the Miranda Rights.

Mission accomplished, thus far.

But something was troubling Neyla somewhat, as she was propelled clumsily forward by the lackluster cops she begrudgingly allowed to incapacitate her; she'd seen the jail cells in the entrance area, lowly lit and sparse except for a dour-looking groundhog and a drunken she-bear. Why hadn't they dropped her off there? She was no threat, and she knew a way to rig a way out from behind those bars in about thirty seconds flat. This was against the plan. This was a big fucking wedge rearing its nasty head into her way. Where in God's name were they taking her?

Abruptly, an unassuming grey door appeared around a corner, and swiftly the officers stomped through it. She could feel its heaviness reverberate as it rattled against its frame. Neyla cursed silently, glaring back and forth between the canine and the swine.

_Fuck-a-doodle-doo_, she thought.

In stereotypical interrogation manner, the room was dark, illuminated only by a solitary ceiling light; a figure sat at a thick-looking metal table, a silhouette only distinguished by the dark from its slender frame and what must have been glasses softly reflecting the scarce light in the room into Neyla's eyes. It beckoned. She was thrust into a seat roughly. Peeved, she reshuffled in her seat and observed her original captors recede quietly into the darkness behind her.

_Fuck-a-doodle-doo_, she thought twice.

The figure sighed deeply, drumming its fingers on the table's metallic surface, and Neyla could see the tired eyes staring out from beneath those brows as her night vision kicked in. It looked like a lizard of some sort, and an older one at that. Its suit remained uninspired. But even so, the glasses created an air of authority that immediately put Neyla at odds with the cop.

A file appeared from under the table, of the common Staples-bought manila type, and drifted onto a position in front of the lizard. Carefully, he opened the file, and Neyla found her own image staring back at her. Mug shots from that sting operation in Cairo, apparently; she could see the painful black eye she'd suffered mere minutes before her photograph was forcibly taken. Glamour couldn't be afforded when it came to legality, she supposed.

She'd hardly noticed the lizard begin to speak, she was thinking so deeply.

"Matilda Kahn. Karla Kucing. Miss Megumi. Stefania Pisică. The Gonzesse. Venus Verma. Lady Dronning of Oslo. All of these aliases, and yet we know your true name, Neyla. Looks like you wasted all of your goddamn time on making up fake people to pretend to be… and yet here you sit, me addressing you by your given name. How does that make you feel?"

He sounded like a shrink. She hated shrinks. She hated anything medically-related.

"Like a fuckin' butterfly. Listen, does this 'ave any relevance to _anythin', _orrrrr can I just go back to bein' incarcerated? I think I'd prefer the second choice, quite 'onestly."

The lizard laughed warm-heartedly. "Spunky. I see. That should serve you quite well. I imagine it has proved largely successful throughout your life, yes?"

She nodded in mock enthusiasm and rolled her eyes. She didn't feel like turning on the charm for this one; she felt being as rude and distasteful as possible would drive him far away from her, which would give Neyla the perfect opportunity to sneak out those ever-important files. For a while, though, it would be necessary to entertain this lizard. 'For a while' were the most emphasized words for her.

Still, the lizard laughed. "Around here they call me Colonel Drake. I prefer just Drake, to be truthful. I suppose you won't be very keen on referring to me by anything remotely benevolent right now, but it's to be expected. No one can expect the criminal to become friends with the law."

"That's bloody right."

Colonel Drake sifted through the different files, neglecting to respond to Neyla's witty comment. "Larceny… petty theft… embezzlement… extortion?"

"Wouldn't you be tempted to use your knowledge of an American senator's secret cocaine industry to its full advantage, given the chance? Oh, no, wait, you're the bobby 'ere, you can't answer anythin' other than 'no' to that particular question."

"I admit… it would be tempting."

Neyla raised an incredulous eyebrow. "Maybe you're not as lost as I thought you were."

"Still quite lost, I'm afraid; I find myself remarkably opposed to breaking the law even when faced with the chance to do so discreetly. When you get as high as up as me in the law enforcement business, there are many, many chances to become corrupt."

"Never mind. You're lost."

"Do try and forgive me," Drake replied, smiling faintly.

"I suppose I can try. A little." Perhaps she could have a little fun with this one before the true interrogating began, whenever it would come. Had they tracked her to Arpeggio? She figured she would persuade him to believe that she'd never heard of such a criminal, but still, it was worrisome to think someone had caught on to one of her best-kept secrets.

They would never get the greatest one, though.

"Do you suppose you can try to cooperate with me in a serious conversation? Outside of this banter, there are real reasons behind my wish to speak with you privately. Please don't mind the dark atmosphere in this back room, though; it does seem rather covert, but quite honestly we can only chalk up this darkness to faulty wiring."

"Oh, goody. I was imaginin' back-room nonsense of the 'dominant/submissive' type, if you catch me—"

"Most certainly not, Ms. Neyla," Colonel Drake huffed indignantly.

"_Kidding, kidding_," she hissed, emphasizing the g's she found herself dropping even more so often lately.

"I believe I spoke before of the tumultuous relationship between law-breakers and law-makers, correct?" Drake said, attempting to change the subject.

"This is true."

"But sometimes they marry, my misbehaving friend."

Suddenly Neyla found herself much more interested in actually listening to the shocked Colonel's words.

"I'm sorry?" she said, leaning forward in her seat.

"As you can clearly see from this file, Ms. Neyla, we know a lot about you; about how you operate, about your skills, and about your ways in the criminal world. We've been studying you, keeping as many tabs as we can… surely you, in all your dealings with crime and fleeing from the law, have heard of Interpol, Ms. Neyla?"

She nodded calmly, leaning ever further over the table.

"Many of my colleagues have come to the conclusion that crime is best fought with criminals themselves… reformed members of society who have a personal element in the crime-fighting realm that puts them ahead of normal police officers by miles. Chances like these open rarely, and even so, the act is highly risky, as you could very well imagine. But it is our opinion, and my own very high opinion adding to this conclusion, that you, Ms. Neyla, are the perfect convert."

Neyla sat back in her seat, slightly stunned. "So… let me get this 'un straight… you're askin' me to leave behind me life of crime and become a part of the Interpol force?"

"Precisely," Drake said. "You're of the right intelligence, right skill set, right athleticism, even right disposition and criminal record… honestly… I could not have found a better match than you if I looked across the world and the seven seas until my death. Believe you me, it already took the better part of my career just to find you, and it was purely by chance in the first place. Quite lucky on my part; quite possibly lucky for you, if you take up the offer."

"Oh, so it's an offer, is it?" Neyla said.

"Indeed. Although the jail-bound alternative doesn't look quite as attractive to me, if I do say so myself."

The memory started to fade out, blurring out into nothingness, but Neyla could remember well enough on her own what followed; she took up that offer, stole the files on her way out, and made what might have been the happiest phone call Arpeggio ever received from her in their long and complicated partnership.

That time, things had actually turned out better than expected, for once in her life.

* * *

><p>"…to me. Captain Neyla?"<p>

Neyla awoke to the disconcerting sight of the mouse nurse, twitching nervously and hovering over her like a vulture over a corpse. She preferred not to be dinner, and quickly sprung up into a sitting position.

"How long was I out?"

"I…I don't quite know. I walked in a minute ago and the machine had pulled you out, finally… you were muttering to yourself and staring at the ceiling. I try to talk to you, but you didn't respond. Up until now, I was quite sure you were in a trance of some sort—"

"A trance? The fuck are you talkin' about, you rodent?"

The mouse drew back into herself, eating the words she'd been prepared to speak. Flustered, Neyla swung off of the table and practically ran out the door. She needed her goddamn clothes, needed to get out of that goddamn hospital, and get to a quiet place where she could bang her head against a wall so the white fuzz in her ears, slowly driving her to deafness, would just leave her THE FUCK alone.

Over the static and the wind as she split through the air with her speed, still she could hear that cold voice, freezing Neyla's bones as it whispered to her from an unknown part of her own mind.

**Running will **_**never**_** take you far enough away from me, kitten. Never.**

"Shut UP, would you?" she screamed to herself, frightening various hospital inhabitants loitering about the halls as she came sprinting through.

Neyla had been capable of running away from many things, varying from rabid animals to cop cars, but no matter how hard her feet pounded against the floor, the voice stuck with her, taunting her from the inside.

Eventually, she found the room where she'd initially taken off her normal attire, and quickly she thrust it all on, more than likely having put on her shirt backwards. She didn't mind it much. The goddamn hospital, it was what was ailing her. She'd been in a place she despised for far too long… it was giving her the spooks, that was all. That pesky voice was something she would look into later, perhaps in the more tolerable psychiatrist's office; for now, Neyla's objectives lied solely with escaping from the hospital and breaking into the fresh air outside, shaking off her misplaced rage.

Discomfort. That's all it was, discomfort, and stress, and exhaustion. Driving her over the edge. Maybe the voice was even a temporary thing, a sort of recurring hallucination from being over-worked. Why, that donkey on the CSI unit had been caught conversing with the water-cooler last month, purely out of exhaustion. Constable Matthews, his name had been. Maybe she'd go pay him a visit, see if he had any good meds for when the mind started to go off course a little bit. Even if she couldn't coerce the ass into giving up some anti-depressants or whatever the hell they'd put him on, a good old-fashioned home invasion would work just fine as a substitute. She could predict her little problem disappearing within a few weeks, given some well-used self-medication.

Deep down inside, Neyla knew her "little problem" wasn't going to be fixed with some psychiatrist's crazy pills.

But still, Neyla did only as she could do.

She ran.


End file.
